Goats are Sneaky

So during my time here I have discovered that goats can be very sneaky. You may think you have closed all the gates, safely tucked them away in the barn, and then an hour later they're all lose eating as much hay as possible. They seem to know to run out right after you check on them. They also love to follow you to a gate or stanchion until they are right next to it and then they quickly veer off, heading far far away as fast as possible. The little ones are funny too. When I play with the babies I let them climb all over me, but every once in a while they still surprise me, jumping from a remarkably far distance from a direction I don't even suspect.

So far though Madrona has been the sneakiest of them all. After p.m. milking a couple of nights ago the other girl I was milking with went to fill the water and came racing back in saying there was a baby. I followed her into the teens pen where she scooped up a little baby. As she cleaned her off I was trying to find the mom, checking all of the really pregnant goats. None seemed like they had just given birth. The only one even making any noise was Madrona, but I didn't think she was too far along in her pregnancy so I didn't pay much attention. She laid back down as I kept looking. A second later though she stood up and turned around. Clearly had just given birth. I called the other girl over as a second girl was born. We took all of them into a separate stall where we cleaned them up and the babies took their first steps. One is all black and the other is light brown with black over her front that makes her look as if she is wearing a hoodie. Super cute! We guess that her due date was wrong, and as these were her first babies she wasn't super big. Like I said, they're full of surprises. No names as of yet, maybe soon.

So How Many Times Have You Summited? Um.......

Back into the swing of things at the farm after the camping trip. It was good to see all the animals again, especially JuJu and the puppies.

I started working at a rental store for guided trips to the summit of Mt Rainer. The owner of the farm is a manager for the company - which also includes a bunkhouse, retail store, and grill - and they needed extra help since people were returning to school. I was a bit nervous since I had no experience with this and I was being trained for literally 20 minutes before being left with another girl from the farm who had been working 5 days. This was going to go well...

Basically people are in a guided group and they get a list of items they need from the guide company, which is associated with the rental store. There are some who do the climb independently but mostly not. We have everything from backpacks, to ice axes, to boots and crampons. Really most things they could possibly. I have to help size them and make sure they get all the gear on there list. Not too difficult but there's definitely a learning curve. Also a fear that I'm sending someone up a snow covered mountain with improper gear... But the guides check that everyone had the right things so at least there's a check. Most things are quick to size but the boot can take forever. One person can take 20 depending on how fussy they are or willing to listen to how they should be sized. One group took at least 30 minutes because the pair of guys were so full of themselves they couldn't stop goofing around. They were back the next day in need of different size boots, a torn parka, and a more sober outlook. I'm curious to see how they make out.

We also check the gear back in. People are generally exhausted by this point and usually impatient to get their stuff back in. They typically fall into two categories - those who made it to the top, are super excited and impatient, and just want to grab food and a drink to celebrate or those who didn't make it, are dissapointed and impatient, and just want to grab food and a drink and try to get it. Either way most just want to throw the stuff at you and get out. Takes less time then giving people gear, but less pleasant. Overall it's neat to learn about the gear and hear about people's hikes. I knew I was getting better with what I was talking about when someone asked me how many times I'd been to the summit. Rather than saying that I've never done it or anything like it I tried to pass it off as just having got there and not getting the chance yet. He was surprised and said by the way I was talking about the gear he just assumed I had. Made me feel like I could at least fake some confidence about this and could make out ok.
Sorry no pics from the store.

Finally Took A Hike

In the morning I woke up early and took a walk along the beach. I thought I'd be able to go a lot farther, but the land jutted into the ocean and looked like it could be passed only at extremely low tide. It was still nice. I sat and watched the sunrise and the mist fade away. There was one extremely brave older couple who were actually swimming. It was fairly cold water, especially for a chilly water.

When I got back the other girls were up so we packed up and took the trek out. We passed some other early risers along the way, but not many others who had camped out. When we got back to the car the person parked next to us started asking what we were up to (our large amount of bags, etc made us stand out a bit). When we told him we had camped along the beach he told us it was pretty brave and he wouldn't have tried. I think he was just trying to make us feel good because it wasn't scary at all and the older couple out camping only emphasized this. It was funny to hear him say that though.

From the beach we went back to the rainforest, but a different area. We had thought about camping with a backcountry permit again, but it was going to be a few miles and we just weren't packed properly for it. The campsite was great though. We had a lake view and were surrounded by huge trees, creating a secluded feeling.

We did a 7 mile hike in the area around the forest and down to the lake. There wasn't much of an elevation change so it was a nice walk. We saw some enormous trees. We missed "the Big Spruce Tree." It was even marked on the map, but it was an extra mile that we weren't up for. Along the hike were pretty waterfalls and even a bog, which was surprising. When we got to the lake we were all warm and ready for a swim. The beach was empty and the water was crystal clear. From there we missed the turn for the trail so we ended up walking the rest of the way along the road. We made dinner out of whatever we had left. It ended up taking a while because once again the wood was wet and didn't light very well. This time we couldn't even get a good fire going but we managed long enough to some bean burgers cooked.

Would have been a better picture without my finger...

Backcountry

Saw an elk in the campground while on my morning walk. I made sure to give him plenty of space.

 Day two and it was time for the beach! After getting used to seeing it everyday for two years, I felt this was long overdue. On the drive over we decided to get a backcountry permit and camp right on the beach rather than a normal campground (a bit of a misnomer in our case since we wouldn't actually be in the woods). We thought it would be fairly early to get the permit, but thanks to limited ranger station hours this actually took quite some effort. First we went to the ranger station nearest the beach and found out they were closed. The sign however said to go to one of two other ranger stations or call a number. The number was useless so it was off to the next closest ranger station. Again, closed. At that point we gave up finding a ranger station (the next was about 2 hours away) and took a hint from other campers and just fill out the form sans official signature. Not the most proper way to do it, but oh well.

After wasting at least an hour doing all that we still had to find a bear canister to keep our food in. We almost threw in the towel at this point but luckily we drove past a general store and I remembered seeing the name on the ranger station's list of places to get one. Turned out to be a pickle bucket. Not really what I was expecting... We took it anyway though.

Our "bear canister". At least it didn't still smell like pickles.

Finally, we made it to Rialto beach. We took a nice walk and scouted out our campsite before grabbing our stuff. You have to walk about 45 minutes to get to anywhere you're allowed to camp. We found a perfect spot right at the beginning of the camping area - above high tide level, soft sand, and sheltered by a couple of large fallen trees. Back we went to the car to get our stuff. Since we had nothing to claim the site with we were a little nervous and kept checking for other people looking like they were going to camp on the beach as we walked back. We saw no one with packs until we got to the car. There we ran into a group of women all geared up and heading in the general direction of our camp site. Rather than lose the perfect spot one of the girls grabbed her backpack and took off powerwalking. Luckily she did because she got there just before the group who were starting to look interested in our area. While that was going on the other girl and I loaded up the rest of the gear and food. It was pretty heavy and a little awkward to carry since we hadn't planned on doing this before leaving, but we got it all to the spot.

There were enormous downed trees all along the beach

The largest seaweed I had ever seen!

The sunset that night was beautiful and we had an amazing fire thanks to all of the driftwood around. Dinner was ratatouille one of the girls had made at the farm. Before going to sleep I walked the pickle bucket with any scented items and food a good 5 minutes away just to be on the safe side. At least if the racoons found it they would still be far away from us.

The birds for mom

A more successful fire

Return to Olympic

I got a chance to go back to Olympic National Park and go camping with two of the other girls. Thanks to some nice scheduling we were able to leave Monday afternoon and stay through Thursday afternoon. Our first day we got there around 4 and camped in the Hoh Rainforest. It's a temperate rainforest. I didn't realize the US had rainforests but I guess the Pacific North Wet would be the place for them. It gets about 137 inches of rain a year! After setting up camp we took a couple of shorter walks.

 The first was the Hall of Moses, about 1/2 mile loop from the visitor center. We saw some amazing moss and lychen, as the name implies, but the best part was the trees. Some were hundreds of years old and easily 200 feet. Many have been blown down due to their shallow root system and the roots, and often the circumference of the trunk was taller than I was. We saw beautiful evergreens and a couple amazing groves of maples trees turning to fall colors and covered with draped moss.

The most vivid (natural) green I've seen in a while

The maple grove

 The next trail was about 1.5 miles and took us to the river. We started up higher and then progressed down old river terraces until we reached the current flood plain. The landscape went from old, dense rainforest to secondary growth to new saplings. You could look behind you and literally see the stark difference between each type.

The trees actually grow on old fallen trees, they look like they're merging together

Secondary growth

Banana slug!!!!!! Largest slug I've ever seen and they're all over the place!

About that point we were all hungry so we headed back to camp. Luckily we were smart and had already set up the tent so all we had to do was start a fire and cook dinner. Thanks to the somewhat wet wood from the campground this was easier said than done. After an absurd amount of time and many, many matches we were able to finally start a fire. The one upside in the whole process was that I finally got to use my hatchet, thanks Dad. Dinner was black bean burgers followed by s'mores. All in all pretty good.

You'd never guess we had so much trouble starting it

I thought this was pretty cute